Scott Landry is accused of yelling "Kill the tree!" and thereby inciting hordes of students to charge onto the field and assault the Stanford mascot after Cal's devastating 42-21 loss at Memorial Stadium on November 23.

In the pandemonium that ensued, frenzied Cal students ripped up the ragged tree costume worn by Stanford student Chris Cary, who was kicked, punched and dragged but otherwise not seriously hurt, UC Berkeley police said.

During a lengthy hearing before a three-member campus committee yesterday, university student conduct manager Doug Zuidema said Landry, in his official capacity as head yell leader, "lit the fuse and gave hundreds of students license to rush the field and attack a human being."

Zuidema said students considered Landry -- known as a "Mic- Man" because he uses a microphone -- a "role model in good sportsmanship" and essentially followed his lead in the destruction.

Landry faces an array of student conduct violations, including damaging and destroying property, disrupting a university activity and disturbing the peace as part of an unlawful assembly.

The campus committee, made up of two professors and one student, is to make a decision on the matter within 10 days. Randy Gaw, a student advocate who defended Landry, said his client was on the sidelines after the game and merely encouraged the students to rush the field.

He brought forth witnesses who said Cal students, as part of tradition, rush the field after each Big Game -- whether Cal wins or loses -- without the influence of a single person.

One witness, senior Jacob Semetko, said that after Cal's 1993 Big Game win, he recalled seeing UC Berkeley Chancellor Chang- Lin Tien with a huge foam football helmet on his head and a big grin -- taunting Stanford fans by holding "a big chunk of grass" that was taken from Stanford Stadium.

Gaw scoffed at the university's contention that Landry alone had the power to cause the melee: "That's saying that the students are incapable of thinking for themselves," he said.

Landry was stripped of his Mic Man duties soon after the incident. In addition, the university wants Landry, a 21-year-old graduating senior, to perform 30 hours of unpaid community service and to pay $300 for a quarter of the tree costume -- an arbitrary calculation, Landry's supporters say.

"I feel like the university's scapegoat," Landry said in an interview. "I'm taking the fall for all of this."